Brooklyn's Big, Tall Wait

By

Jason Gay

July 10, 2012 8:42 p.m. ET

This is happening. Construction has been underway for years, and underneath the growing colossus at Atlantic and Flatbush is a bubbly layer of contentiousness that will probably never go away. But Jay-Z is opening the joint in September; seats go on sale Friday. Barbra's coming, so is Bieber. Fifteen hundred basketball season tickets were sold in the past week, the biggest haul yet. The black and white T-shirts and hats are now in abundance. During a swing by the nearby Modell's earlier in the week, a salesperson reported a top seller was the tee with sneaker soles filling the archways of the Brooklyn Bridge.

ENLARGE

The Nets and Deron Williams have already made their way to Brooklyn. Will Dwight Howard join them?
Associated Press

The Nets are coming.

Still, important details are fuzzy. The arena-in-progress resembles a rusty turtle, a shell of weathered steel and glass lurching its way into the intersection like it wants to cross the street and buy a dryer at P.C. Richard. And the team? The team is better off than it was a few weeks back. Deron Williams, the magnificent point guard and engine, is staying. Gerald Wallace will be back. Joe Johnson is en route from Atlanta. They will be sturdier and much more fun to watch than the 22-44 sandy bathing suit that closed out the Jersey era.

But it's not complete yet. By now you surely have been sucked into this other drama, the one involving Brooklyn and the Orlando Magic star Dwight Howard. This is not to be confused with other dramas involving Dwight Howard, like the one after the NBA lockout, which ended with the All-Star center staying put, or the one close to trade deadline, which ended with Orlando and Howard double-pinky-swearing that this maddening issue had been resolved.

This drama feels closer, realer, maybe because the Nets are now in Brooklyn, but also because there appears to be true momentum, more moving parts spinning toward a deal. But every hour, it seems to change. Maybe it's a deal between the Nets, Orlando and Cleveland. Maybe a fourth team is involved. The L.A. Clippers? How about a fifth or sixth party? The Chicago White Sox? Berkshire Hathaway? Perhaps it will revert to a simple swap between the Nets and Orlando. Or maybe the deal will grow so complicated and interwoven that, as the Journal's Kevin Clark wrote on Twitter, the Magic will accidentally wind up trading Howard back to themselves.

It's exhausting, it really is. These journeys into the front office sausage factory absorb so much attention and screen time they feel like an aggravating second season. Does any player ever escape the process unscathed? I think there's still residual irritation from Carmelo Anthony's long-winded exit from Denver to New York. Anthony may have gotten what he wanted, but not before driving basketball fans a little bonkers, and as he struggles to ignite these Knicks, it's hard not to remember the extended, exasperating machinations it took to bring him here.

Were Howard to come to Brooklyn, he would instantly make the Nets a playoff contender. I think this is an acceptable, low-weight expectation. I'm not ready to claim the Howard Nets would demolish the Miami Heat. I'm utterly unconvinced the addition of Howard would be enough to "steal the city" from the Knicks—you could lock the Knicks in a closet for 30 years, and they'd probably still have a bigger fan base. (The Nets should be their own thing, and avoid tweaking their cross-town neighbor too hard—look how dopey the Jets wound up seeming after trying to out-clamor the Giants.) Howard would sell tickets, give Brooklyn's debut more fuss. But this debut is going to have fuss no matter what. The most important thing Howard can do is win.

This is why we wait. Good things in Brooklyn can take more time. Leave Manhattan to the rushers and elbow-throwers and frantic cases pulling jumpy, nervous dogs. People here will spend a half hour picking through bad LPs left on a brownstone stoop, or circle the block endlessly, hoping to spy on-street parking. There's a coffee shop my wife insists on going to—I'm not kidding, you order a cappuccino and I believe the cashier goes behind the counter and reads 40 pages of "The Catcher in the Rye." The experience is annoying as anything. Somehow it turns out to be worth it.

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